DATA AND NOTES. 237 



or animals has been shed and forms a pool on the ground, one feeling the 

 smell of it, or of any similar thing, says i nabwo mofa, it smells mofa," and 

 identifies it with Arabic ma'habat a small pool, wahaba to give, to make an 

 offering. Yet in the foregoing there nowhere appears for mofa the sense of 

 giving or offering which without hesitation he assigns when dealing with 

 it in the taumafa composition. The only sense which may be derived from 

 the narrative, not definition, of mofa is to say that when the smell of blood 

 is felt, if indeed that be possible in sense perception, and one says it smells 

 mofa the word is meant to describe the apperception of shed blood by the 

 nose. Not in the least inclined to accept the circuitous Arabic identifi- 

 cation I see in mofa no suggestion of the radical t. 



Working on different materials Tregear has isolated tau to pray in Tahiti 

 and the mafa of mamafa heavy. The latter at least is Proto-Samoan maf at. 

 But tau nowhere else in Polynesian means to pray. Bishop Jaussen gives 

 tau in the prayer sense but altogether omits tarotaro (160), which Tregear 

 must have obtained from English missionary sources. Assuming the sub- 

 stantial accuracy of the bishop's dictionary it is possible that Tahiti tau 

 by the not infrequent loss of / (e. g., valu eight Tahiti vau) may be associable 

 with talo to pray. The association with mafat is excellent in the preserva- 

 tion of the radical t, but the correlation of sense leaves much to be desired. 



162. 

 tauri, to bind, to be bound firmly to, to marry (a woman), to tie firmly to 

 (as a boat to a ship to be towed) ; taura ki, to be fixed or bound 

 firmly to one, bringing out one as from bondage or from her 

 relations, to redeem, to marry; bitauri, to be bound, tied, 

 attached firmly to each other, to be married. 

 Samoa : tau, taulia, to be anchored, to be fixed (as colors in cloth) ; 

 taula, an anchor; taulanga, anchorage; taula'i, to anchor with 

 or to; tauvale, to marry beneath one. Tonga: taulanga, 



anchorage ; taufau, to tie. Futuna : taula, an anchor, a cable ; 

 taulanga, anchorage. Niue : taula, an anchor. Uvea : taula, 

 an anchor; taulanga, anchorage. Nukuoro: taura, a rope. 

 Maori: tow, to lie at anchor or moorings; taura, a rope; tauranga, 

 anchorage; tatau, to tie; taunga, a support, bond, tie, a bond 

 of connection between families; taumau, betrothed. Tahiti: 

 tau, an anchor; taura, a rope; tauri, to be intermixed as a 

 family in a house ; tardea, to rescue, to deliver. Rarotonga : 

 taura, a rope. Marquesas : tau, a rope ; katau, atau, an anchor. 

 Mangareva: tauri, to tie together; tour a, a cord. Hawaii: 

 kau, to tie on ; kaula, a rope ; kaupili, to unite, as man and wife. 

 Sesake: matau, an anchor. Mota: taur, to hold. 

 Arabic: sabara, sabr', to bind, to be bound to. 

 The Proto-Samoan stem is taul. 



The Polynesian tau is protean in its shifts of meaning. I have here segre- 

 gated only such as are associable with Efate tauri. Other senses will be 

 found in 236 and 267. 



In the Melanesian identifications Mota is satisfactory. We lack the data 

 to establish the value of ma in Sesake matau which seems to be a composite 

 of this tau. 



